The present invention, in some embodiments thereof, relates to imaging and, more particularly, but not exclusively, to a method and a system for image processing.
Digital cameras are widely used due to high quality and low cost CMOS technology and the increasing popularity of social network. The demand for high resolution and quality cameras, specifically for smart phones, led to a competitive market that constantly tries to create a better camera.
Digital image quality is determined by the imaging system properties and focal plane array sensor. With the increase in pixel number and density, the imaging system resolution is bound now mostly by optical system limitation. The limited volume in smart phones makes it very difficult to improve the image quality by optical solutions and therefore most of the advancements in recent years were software related.
Ref [1] discloses a binary symmetrical phase mask that allows increasing the camera's Depth of Field (DOF) for different uses such as barcode reading, face detection as well as other computer vision related applications. Ref. [2] discloses a RGB phase mask, whereby one gets different responses for the R, G and B channels, resulting in simultaneous capturing of three images, each with a different out-of-focus characteristics, but with the same magnification and in perfect registration. Different regions in the object space may exhibit good gray level features in one channel and poorer gray images in the other two channels. The three channels (RGB) jointly analyzed enable the extended DOF system response.
Additional background art includes U.S. Pat. No. 8,682,066, the contents of which are hereby incorporated by reference.